


Guileless Child

by elisi, redjaded (timeheist)



Series: The Redjay [7]
Category: Doctor Who & Related Fandoms
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-04
Updated: 2012-07-18
Packaged: 2017-11-06 20:22:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 5
Words: 12,174
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/422821
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elisi/pseuds/elisi, https://archiveofourown.org/users/timeheist/pseuds/redjaded
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which the Redjay meets the Master's son.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [elisi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/elisi/gifts).



> This takes place during Roda's 6th then 7th regenerations, and takes place during and around The Year That Never Was (chapter 3 comes after 'A Place to Stay' and before 'A Proposition', as well as after chapter 20 of 'Dating the Cleverest Boy in the World'). Alexander 'the Seeker' Saxon belongs to elisi.

The Master crouched down in front of the fallen woman, her hair knotted in and out around his fingers until he could roughly yank her head up. With his free hand clasped around her throat, checking that she was still breathing – and unsure of which result his craved – he turned his head across the small cell to gaze at where his wife and child stood across the room. A jerk of his head brought Lucy Saxon almost dancing closer with a defined giggle, and though the Master’s lip curled as he studied his prisoner a cruel amusement seasoned his own looks; the same, his words. Lucy’s swollen lips showed what the decision to torture his enemy had interrupted the Master from. Almost caressing the woman’s bruised throat – and oh, she did turn spectacular shades of purple and blue and red with abuse, that lasted so much longer than the freak’s – he briefly looked up at the week old baby that his wife held, meeting his eyes as though the child could understand every word he was saying.

The Master gestured at the prone woman. “You see this, Alexander?” In the same breath, he held just a little too tightly to his captive’s throat. Lucy scowled jealously, but the other woman jerked conscious with a choked noise that could have been a growl or a whimper. Pleased that she was too legless, too injured to fight herself free, the Master snorted and let her drop to the floor to prove the point he was about to make. The brunette’s knees, with the way her head spun, seemed to rise to meet the floor with a sickening crack, but the Master’s smug approval did not last long. As much as his often deficit attention could he returned his thoughts to his son, as Lucy leaned over him like an apprentice watching her master’s trade. It was an apt comparison, he felt. He grinned, and baby Alexander blinked just once, not distracted like any other child would be. To the trained eye, it was clear he was listening. “This is what our race should never be.”

“M-M-...”

“Sorry, what was that...” The Master paused for dramatic effect, “Redjay?” He cupped his hand over his ear and beckoned Lucy closer, belatedly thinking to wipe the blood on his hands that was not his own off on his prisoner’s shirt collar. It only added to the tapestry of satisfying colours he’d painted across her skin, or the woad that she’d chosen to dirty herself with of her own accord. His nose wrinkled just for a second, and he straightened up from his crouch, looking down on the Time Lady before him. “M-M-Master? M-M-More? M-M-Madness?” The suggestions slowed as the Master stopped to think. “M-M-Murder?” Jack’s body, of course, was slumped at the other end of the room, three bullets in his brain as punishment for trying to save his friend. Three more in the spine, killing him more slowly, when he’d woken up. Although the treatment was comparatively better than the treatment Jack had already received (not least of all the time the Master had made Roda kill him) it was the only act of violence in the room that the Master had separated his son from. The gun shot, he’d announced, might have woken him up. “Or was it m-m-mangle?” The Master shivered dramatically. “I love that word!”

The Redjay managed her growl this time, driving her elbows into the Dalekanium tiles as she desperately tried to stand and fight. Supporting her weight proved more tasking than summoning the courage, and she sank back down, one cheek pressed dejectedly into the floor. As though her brain was detached from her actions, it took her too many seconds of silence to form the word that she was looking for. “...Monster.”

“Oh Roda!” Ever the thespian, the Master brushed down his lapels and wore a mask of well-practiced pain. One hand strayed to press against his hearts, his thumb curled against the haft of his precious laser screwdriver, while his other snaked possessively around Lucy’s waist, pulling mother and child closer. “Can a father be a monster?” With a gasp, his transferred his hand from chest to mouth, turning his head to bury it in Lucy’s neck. His fingers gripped the brunette’s shoulders tight enough to leave parallel fingers of red on the bare shoulder to match her dress; motherhood had done nothing yet to distract from the human’s beauty. “If I’m a monster does that mean my son is too?” With one question, the Master’s tone drifted from mocking to vicious, each syllable striking like a thousand shards of glass. The Redjay flinched before she could stop herself, and Lucy’s scowl deepened. Roda didn’t reply, and the Master waved an angry, dismissive hand. “What would the Doctor say? You should be ashamed of yourself. Picking on a Time Tot like that!” He tsked. “You’re more pathetic by the minute.”

Anger gave Roda the strength to form sentences. “I don’t care what you think. It’s the Time Tot I feel sorry for! So you and your whore can fu-“

The High Gallifreyan that the Time Lady spoken – translated for Lucy by her exposure to artron energy and a TARDIS – was silenced before it could finish by the Master’s hand grabbing her jaw. A deft flick of his wrist brought the curve of his palm hard against her mouth, silencing her, while the other hand dislodged feathers and further smudged the woad on the Redjay’s shoulders to pull her back to her feet, roughly, so that she could be thrown against the wall and the threadbare mattress in the corner. Lights swept and dived in front of her eyes in balls of white as she snarled, too dazed to manage further words. The Master’s hand came slashing across her freckled face, signet ring cutting a neat crescent from under one eye to the side of her mouth. It was the paint in the cuts – by that point – that hurt her more than the impact; had Roda’s hands not been bound behind her back, she would have blocked the blow, or brushed away the blood collecting like a tear on her cheek. The Master breathed heavily, but comforted the distraught Lucy, shushing Alexander’s cries and coming back into himself. Embracing his family, he looked down at the Redjay disdainfully.

It was Lucy who spoke first, her voice that lilting trill that the world had grown to know her for. Roda, Jack, the Doctor, and the Jones’ all knew that behind the innocent exterior was a woman well suited to the insanity of the Master. But like the Master, Lucy Saxon could be just as touchy. “You don’t know what you’re talking about!”

Lighting up again, the Master laughed madly, resting one hand gently on the receptive Alexander’s forehead. Astute even for a Time Tot, the baby fell silent immediately as he knew his father wanted him to. “Oh, dear Lucy is right, Roda. What do you know about children?”

“Don’t call me Roda.”

“I mean really,” The Master ignored her words, driving the tip of his boot into her kidney to pin her in place as he fussed over Lucy and Alexander. Roda dragged in what oxygen was left in the room; it was her claustrophobia instead of the torture that robbed the exile of logical rejoinders. “You?” He snorted. “A Time Lady, exiled for treason during her second regeneration? A heathen? An outlaw even on Earth?” Lucy smirked this time. “You’re an insult to the entire Time Lord race.” The Master practically crowed. “Oh, but the Pythia’s Curse!” A hand slapped against his forehead. “How could I forget? You always wanted children, didn’t you. How does it feel, Roda, to know that I have a child and you?” He took the pressure off her torso too quickly, and she doubled over in pain so quickly that the reflex bypassed her nervous system. “You never can.”

“Stop it!” The Redjay spoke over the shield of her kneecaps, her eyes wide with fury and over a millennia of loss.

The Master laughed, ever patent in his triumph.“It’s not like you’ve even had a family, not after Old Meyerodeon was mur¬-!”

“Say another word, Master, I will... Will...” Roda’s resolve failed her at last, and the Master – taking Alexander from Lucy’s arms at last, sniffed and waved his wrist.

“What did I say, love?” Lucy rested her chin on his shoulder, nodding calmly. She didn’t even spare the Redjay another glance, but she laughed as she and the Master spoke in unison. “Pathetic.”

“Bastards!”

Balancing Alexander in one arm, the Master pulled his laser screwdriver from his chest pocket and burned a perfect circle into the Redjay’s shoulder that send her recoiling into the wall as though it would swallow her up. She was too undernourished and injured, after months on the Valiant, for her usual regenerative abilities to defend her. Her gaze fell, her already broken mind transgressing into the mother she’d never met, the father she’d lost, and the child who’d never survived. The Master purred. “You should respect your Master.” His work was done, but even as Jack roared and wrenched awake, the Master couldn’t resist one more jibe. The prisoners could stay in the same room for now. With Lucy on his arm and Alexander’s eyes drifting shut, the Master paused in the doorway. “Why don’t you ask the freak for help? I’m sure he’d be willing to father another illegitimate child so long as he gets laid.” The door slammed shut, and locked. The Redjay fell, and sobbed. Minutes later, Jack had crossed the room and wrapped his arms around her in silence.

It was nearly half an hour before he finally spoke. “I’m so sorry Ro-Ro.” He kissed her forehead, blood trickling down his spine from the dissolved bullets in his back, and careful not to hurt her more held her tight against his chest as her cries soaked them both. Roda tried to push him away with her shoulder. The Master’s words had made more impression than he realised; Roda was ashamed to be jealous of Jack’s family. The same family he’d not heard hide nor hair of since his incarceration in the Valiant. But Jack stubbornly held her arms and stroked her hair, standing in for the family the Master had claimed she didn’t have. He understood her pain all too well. “I never knew.”


	2. Heirs

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A missing scene from just after chapter 1, introducing the current (fanon) state of the Pythia's Curse.

“Now; are you going to show some respect, or do I have to wash your mouth out with soap?”

Roda didn’t even bother to try and stand. She was tired. Sentences weren’t worth the effort, especially if she was wasting her voice on her captor. And especially since she had only just gotten to sleep, in a content-as-you-can-be-when-you’re-a-prisoner sort of sprawl with her head in a familiar, friendly lap.

Roda wasn’t sure how much time had passed, or when Jack had been removed – he wouldn’t have just left, time’s impossible soldier, even if it was the smart thing to do – but she was pretty certain that it hadn’t been much and the Master had made sure of that, too. And so in an act of world-weary defiance Roda simply lifted her head. If the Master wanted her to stand and or to bow he could bloody well try and make her.

And likewise, she didn’t answer him. Hadn’t he rubbed enough salt into her wounds today? She hadn’t thought one single Time Lord could dislike her so much because of one little thing like overthrowing a ten year dictatorship on a primitive planet. Maybe now he ruled Sol-3 it reminded him of Bandraginus V.

Of course she was a Time Lord, and even undernourished and dehydrated she would heal so much faster than any of his human prisoners. The bruises and burns colouring her skin would fade within a day or two. It didn’t matter how much he hit her, or threatened others into doing so, or paid-and-rewarded others to do so. She could take it better than some, and she’d been through worse, so she kept reminding herself in her prison cell. Daleks, most recently. But it wasn’t the Master’s petty thrashing that got to her as it was his ability to achieve the impossible, and willingness to flaunt it. And Roda didn’t trust herself to talk, quite yet.

“I suppose admiring silence will have to do.” Roda fought down a ‘fuck you’. The Master smirked expectantly, sure that she would rise to the bait, and Roda simply raised her chin higher when his eyes narrowed and his smile tightened. “Well that’s gratitude for you.” The Master flexed his neck, rubbing his hand across a whisper of stubble; Roda hoped he was at least exhausted from adding ‘raise an evil heir’ to his list of things to do before bedtime. “Here I thought you’d be throwing yourself at my feet and singing my praises for telling you how to get around the Pythia’s Curse.”

That finally got the Master the reaction that he wanted. The brunette clapped his hands triumphantly, rocking on his heels before crouching to his opponent’s level and still managing to loom over him. Roda, her jaw dropping nearly to the floor, belatedly shifted backwards and upwards, using the wall to gain a little height. It was difficult work – Jack would have unbound her wrists but they’d both decided the Master would make them regret it later – and once again she had been stunned into disbelief. When had he – what had he – 

Roda worked her aching jaw, swallowing down nausea and trying to articulate. “Tell me.”

“Oh, tut tut. What’s the magic word?” Roda narrowed her eyes and pursed her lips and the Master threw up one hand as though in resignation of trying to train an unruly dog. “Strike one. I’m sure Lucy has a bar of soap somewhere in one of the bathrooms.”

The Master was dangling a poisonous carrot in front of her eyes and they both knew it. But for the first time in their unfriendly acquaintance he held all the cards. Or very nearly every one. The only trump card Roda had was that she could – easily – end his fun quite ultimately. Though that, too, they both knew wouldn’t happen.

Roda closed her eyes, swallowing, knowing full well that she was going to have to play nice. The Master could get around the Pythia’s Curse without a Matrix. All the evidence was there in the could-only-be-a-Time Tot he had paraded in front of her earlier. A fully aware child should never have been able to be born. And the Curse, Rassilon’s damned error, had made certain of that. No Time Lord would ever get pregnant again.

Of course the Time Lords themselves had found a way to conceive; their collective survival instinct kept their race from dying out. They’d looked to the Matrix, to science, for help, in the absence of any gods left to pray to. And naturally the option was out of bounds to exiles. The severance from the Matrix was for more than just humiliation and disownment; they Council couldn’t have them breeding now, could they? But the Master wasn’t an exile, only a renegade; with Gallifrey in place he might still had the means for it. There had been successful cases of Time Lords successfully fathering children with surrogate near-Time Lord mothers, but they were one in more than a million and thought impossible without the Matrix. For Time Ladies, it was far more complicated.

Roda choked back her pride, pushing herself to her feet on legs that seemed to belong to a newborn animal as the Master reclaimed his, turning to leave. Roda’s eyes never left him, as she wondered to herself what she would sell to the devil for an explanation he would surely never share with her.

“Tell me…!” Her voice broke and Roda tried to feign a cough even as the Master smirked. She took a lurching step forward, nearly falling, and corrected herself obediently, doing as the Master wanted at last. “Please.”

“Was that so hard?” The Master patted Roda’s cheek with deceptive gentleness, putting one hand on her waist to steady her as he undid the ropes around her wrists with almost restrained negligence to her welfare. Well, he wasn’t about to start now. A reward and attention for ‘good behaviour’. The similarity to Pavlov’s dogs, the attempts to ‘train her’, after so many months on the Valiant, was not lost on Roda. Right now she didn’t care. She rubbed her raw wrists as the Master stoked his fingertips up her forearm and let her side go, holding her up by the elbow. Far be it for his captive audience to fall to the ground and miss a second of him enjoying the sound of his own mocking voice. When the Master didn’t continue Roda realised his question wasn’t rhetorical, and shook his head. “Good girl.” Her cheek was patted again, and Roda nearly drew blood from her cheek trying not to bare her teeth.

“Please.”

His drawing it out was driving Roda crazy. He wasn’t going to give her what she wanted, but she would hate herself if she didn’t try. Once upon a time what he was discussing (almost what he was discussing) had been if not common, at least known knowledge. But it was knowledge for only a handful of doctors and now, the means were lost to them all. And yet the Master had insinuated that there was a way Roda could do it. It made perfect sense; whether he wanted it or not, the Master was not one to let anyone or anything dictate what he could or couldn’t do. He was the person who would have found a way, though Roda had never believed it to be possible, the thought never crossing her mind. The Master sighed, playing the impatient parent. “Where was I? Ah, yes.” He shot her what would have been a charming smile. “I already told you the answer.” Slim fingertips dug into her arm. “Weren’t you listening?”

“You didn’t-“

“You never were a quick one, Roda…!” The Master smiled, and rapped one finger between her eyes. “Maybe you’re getting worse, though. Different coloured eyes?”

“It’s common enough.”

Roda scowled. One blue, one green. Her last regeneration had been a rough one again, very nearly in the company of Daleks; she hadn’t focused as well as she could have. But she was older than the Master, four hundred years or so older, and he should have… Well. Roda would feel like a hypocrite to say he should respect his elders. She never had. In fact, she’d been told years after her exile that her mindset and behaviour would have been better-suited to the renegade’s era, when Gallifrey would have been more lenient and less blindly traditional.

“You can’t even regenerate properly. Maybe evolution’s going backwards for you. It didn’t have much to work with, anyway.”

Snapping, Roda raised her voice, wrenching her arm free of the Master and drawing her hand back to strike him.

“At least I can fu-”

“Ster-rike two.”

Roda dropped. She supposed it was her own fault for leaping before she could walk. Catching herself just in time, she crossed her ankles over and landed on her rear, wincing just a little. The Master looked surprised, which Roda considered a small and uncommon victory. Coughing, stroking her sandpaper-like throat, Roda thanked her DNA for turning her back from a frog and tried to nonchalantly continue along as though she hadn’t accidentally relinquished her balance.

“Fine. You didn’t tell me anything, your Majesty.”

“That’s better.” The Master wiped his hands down on his shirt collar, fingertips dancing a quickstep across his laser screwdriver where it was stowed in his chest pocket. He folded his arms. Roda reminded herself not to flinch. “Maybe you can teach an old dog new tricks.” The Master began to pace, circling Roda thoughtfully; Roda noticed how he glanced at the clock more than once, and wondered if she should try to keep him talking and shorten the time he had to spend with the Doctor, Jack, and the Joneses. “Let’s see. I’m sure I mentioned the freak. Did you pick up what I meant when I said you’ll never have a child? Of course, so long as I’m in control, I’ll never let you…”

Roda’s eyes widened, and she swallowed, crouching on her haunches as the Master’s pacing stopped. One hand splayed across the floor and not for the first Roda lamented the absence of a bow, a knife, or a gun. Or even a heavy, blunt object. “So it’s true.”

“Of course it is. Why lie when the truth hurts more?” Roda’s mouth opened and shut. “Funny how I worked it all out when I never even planned on having an heir, isn’t it?”

Roda smirked. “You have to die to need an heir.”

The Master sniffed. “It’s politics, Roda, you wouldn’t understand.” He paused, and Roda raised an eyebrow, and after a brief pause the Master shrugged and spread his hands acquiescently. “I’ll give you that. Can’t bring down a government without knowing how it works.” There was a dark flash behind his eyes that passed just as quickly. “But you could never build one.”

Roda nodded. “I wouldn’t want to. And you’re changing the subject.”

“Patience, patience. I can still get that soap…”

“I didn’t say a word!”

“Oh, it’d just be fun. Maybe the freak could…” The Master waved a hand, “But I agree, I digress. Alexander will rule the world, one day. Any son of mine will have more success than his primitive namesake.”

“I’m surprised you didn’t call him Rassilon.”

“Perhaps I’ll name his brother after that despot.” The Master tapped his bottom lip. His voice was so calm that it startled Roda to realise they were having a civil conversation (she resigned herself, too, to the fact that they had gone off on a tangent). No matter how much animosity was between himself, herself and the Doctor, they were still the last of their kind. Or at least the last adults. No one else quite came close. “Or Omega, perhaps. Someone with some modicum of intelligence.” Roda, who had been raised by Rassilon for a reasonable portion of her Tothood, stifled a surprising laugh.

“Didn’t the Doctor meet him?”

“Bit mad by then, I think.”

“Well,” Roda snorted, standing up once more. She was starting to feel like a yo-yo. “You two would get along very well.”

“And strike three, you’re out!” The Master tutted, stroking his jaw and walking towards Roda until he backed her into the wall mock-gently, with a hand against her recently-burned shoulder blade. “I’m disappointed. Unsurprised.” He knotted his hand into her hair instead, twirling the spine of one feather in his fingers. “But disappointed.” Roda clenched her teeth, and withdrew before she did something stupid.

“Hey!”

A yelp escaped her lips, and the Master gave a start of pleasure to realise he was left holding not a Time Lady but a feather from her hair, one of the few ones not worn down by disrepair and neglect. He held it up to the dim light before tucking it into his breast pocket beside the laser screwdriver. Roda looked at him as though he’d taken one of her fingers.

“Think of it as pre-payment.” Roda thought of it more as a trophy. “Maybe I’ll tell you later, if you can’t work it out.” The Master paused. “I might get bored. Or I might need a guinea-pig. My boy,” Emphasis on the possessive, “Is still something of a medical miracle after all. Oh, and by the way.” The Master reached into his pocket and drew out a small packet, swiftly tossing it to Roda before she could even think to put up her hands and protect her face. The door whirred open, and the Master twirled out. Roda glanced at her hands and tried not to let her heart sink. “The freak sends his love.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In the Doctor Who novels - whose canon is dubious - the Pythia was the name for the leader of Gallifrey, which prior to Rassilon's revolution (in the Big Finish audios, whose canon is also dubious (but loved by me)) was a matriarchy. Rassilon and Omega were scientists who opposed her superstitious/religious way of ruling the planet and the lack of any advancement. After Rassilon overthrew the government and before Omega created time travel, the Pythia cursed the Gallifreyans with infertility, leading to the stillborn of many children, including Rassilon's. In the novels this led to the creation of the Looms which resulted in fully-grown unintelligent Time Lords being created, which I always found a little... silly, if I'm honest.
> 
> But my headcanon, at least for this fanon, is that the Time Lords did develop a sort of IVF treatment that was dependent on the Matrix (and Too Complicated to explain with modern medical terminology). This stopped them from dying out, and allowed the population to be highly regulated, with quotas of Time Tots being allowed for every chapter (eg. Prydonian, Patrex...) within a certain period and 'pregnancies' occurring in batches, which was why many Tots went up to the Vortex at the same time. However, to explain Alexander 'the Seeker' Saxon, as well as Susan Foreman, I theorised that in very rare scenarios a male Time Lord is able to father a child with a near-Time Lord surrogate female... and then of course the Master did some clever stuff and discovered something, because no one tells him what he can't do.
> 
> This is quite clear in my head but tricky to articulate in the fic, of course. I hope it's not too difficult to follow. I'm hoping to write a follow up for this, but it won't be until quite late in Roda's story... near the finality, in fact.


	3. Chapter 2

The Year That Never Was was twelve months that nobody should ever have to remember, least of all an enemy of the Master’s or a friend of the Doctor’s. The Redjay and he, respectively, fell neatly into both categories, but Jack hadn’t been so lucky as to fringe the time rift that reversed the year, instead of standing in the eye of the ‘storm’. Roda – when the UNIT team had found her where Jack and the Doctor failed – had been scarred, but mostly suffering from short-term memory loss like the rest of the world. When Jack managed to see her, he’d begged the Doctor to let her continue to forget. Later, after she'd disappeared without a word from their care, Jack and the Doctor had found out her TARDIS was damaged, too, but they'd still kept their mouths shut. With the Doctor too busy with Alexander and the Master, it hadn’t been difficult to ensure. The Master wasn’t likely to listen to him but would enjoy gloating over an enemy’s confusion, and Lucy would follow along in the game in his game without any persuasion. Jack hadn’t even considered the idea that Alex would get to see the Redjay again, let alone spill the beans of the secret that had been under lock and key three or four years, depending how you looked at it, and let alone at the age of three, in the Hub.

“Roda! Thought you were the Doctor.”

“That was the idea; that particular blue police box never starts enemy fire on Sol-3.”

“True...” The ex-conman pouted, leading the woman properly into the Hub. “But you could have called first. I’d have sent the boys home and made the bed.”

“I’m interrupting a threesome? Jack, tell me they’re human at least.”

“What?” Jack blinked, then laughed. As he opened his mouth to explain a pair of knee-high bodies threw themselves at his legs, one diving behind him to laugh and hide from the other and one clutching a soft toy under one arm as he ran. “No... The boys.”

“I see-“

“Why does the lady have blue paint on her face, Uncle Jack?”

“Steven! Be polite.”

“But why does she?”

Jack swept the boy behind his legs up into his arms, tickling his stomach mercifully and then balancing him on one side of his hip. The other child stood calmly beside him, not even reaching for the adult’s hand. Roda gauged them as about three years old, but there was... Something familiar about the unnaturally silent boy on Jack’s left. “Roda, this is Steven, my nephew.” Jack met Roda’s gaze as he spoke, promising that he would explain Steven later. “And this is...” He swallowed, unable to maintain eye contact from guilt, or worry. “This is Alex. I’m looking after him for a friend. Boys?” They both looked up at Jack, Steven much more slowly than Alex had done. “This is the Re-“

“Roda. Call me Roda.” Jack watched as Roda’s tense demeanour all but vanished in a flash. His own grandson was fished out of his arms and into hers with a laugh. “Do you want to know why I have paint on my face? It’s to scare little children like you!” Jack had never known Roda liked children so much, or how good she was with them. If Alice would listen to him, then Roda could be a fantastic babysitter. Then again, Roda didn’t know how much Jack knew about her, or how much she longed for a family of her own, a longing that an ancient Gallifreyan curse had stolen from her at birth. It was Alex who seemed the most uncomfortable in the Hub, even going so far as to drag the toes of one of his feet across the floor and mumble incoherent words to Igglepiggle – his stuffed toy – instead of joining in the game between Steven and Roda. Eventually he spoke up, and Roda froze.

“Why can’t you have you own children, Roda?”

“Alex!” Jack scolded the Time Tot, but he had no idea what to say. As his gaze flicked between Roda and Alex, almost fearing for Steven being caught in some kind of crossfire, he waited for recognition to dawn on the Redjay’s face instead of the same blank confusion mixed with horror that she wore now.

“Are you angry at my Daddy because he does and you don’t?” Alex paused, and his bottom lip wobbled. “Are you angry at me?”

“Alex!”

“And what happened to your Daddy?”

Jack tried not to lose his temper, but he was getting desperate. Roda put Steven down, and Jack opened a nearby drawer with a clatter of pens and paperclips and thrust a chocolate bar into his grandson’s hands with instructions to go and play with Gwen and not touch anything important. All that remained was a shell-shocked Roda slowly crouching down in front of Alex, studying him intently and then covering her mouth with her hand. Jack gripped her shoulder tightly, and forced his angry tone into submission. “Roda?”

“He’s – he’s half Time Lord?” Roda blinked up at Jack, but her gaze sharply turned back to Alex’s. “Are you a Time Tot?”

“Yeah!” Alex beamed proudly, squeezing his toy more tightly. “Daddy’s a Time Lord and Mummy’s a human. Daddy said you’re a Time Lady.” Confused, Roda nodded confirmation then closed her eyes for a second, and Jack worried she had remembered something. Just as the Time Lady came back into herself, Alex bounced and reached out for one of the feathers knotted into Roda’s hair, holding it in one small hand. Jack could almost hear the gears moving in his head. “Daddy had a feather like that on his desk. Was it yours?”

“And...” Roda wanted to reach out for the Tot’s telepathy but was worried she’d hurt him, and instead settled for rocking onto her heels as she spoke. Jack was silently glad that he’d told her long ago she wasn’t allowed to bring her bow and arrows into the Hub – just in case. “Who is Daddy?”

“The Master.” The Time Tot didn’t even blink as he said it, very matter-of-fact, and he had more to say. “I was born on the Valiant. I remember you.”

“I was never on any... Valiant...?”

“Alexander Saxon, that’s enough...” Jack’s warning tone was almost enough to quieten the boy, but Alex put his hand on the side of Roda’s cheek, ignoring Jack and frowning. It was clear that something confused him, and it was all that Roda could do not to recoil from his touch. Her teeth bared for a second, before she remembered she was talking to a child.

“But she’s forgotten, Uncle Jack.” Roda did recoil. Her head was beginning to hurt. “She’s forgotten The Year That Never Was.”

“Jack Harkness, what is he talking about?”

“Ro-Ro, I-“

“Jack, please. I’m still older than you.” Roda narrowed her eyes. “If you won’t tell me, Alex will.”

Jack started to panic. “Alex, don’t-“

“But she wants me to.”

Candid as always, Alex reached for the side of Roda’s head again, and stood on tiptoes to press his forehead to hers. When Alex had told her all he knew, the Redjay sank from her haunches to the ground, with her head in her hands.

***

“I shall be forever known as the woman who convened on the coffee as though the Daleks had offered her a final meal before exterminating her.”

“You should talk to Ianto.” Jack chuckled, cradling his own mug as Roda downed her first and reached for the still steaming pot. “Although I think his relationship with the coffee machine is slightly less than platonic.” He paused, then whispered conspiratorially. “I’m starting to get jealous. Should I ask them about a-?”

“Jack!”

“Fifty first century, remember?”

“I know, I know...” Roda sighed, and Jack put his arm around her, careful not to jostle their drinks. “It’s just a lot to take in.”

“I’m surprised you’re taking it this well.”

When Roda had snapped out of her thoughts, the first place she’d headed was the coffee machine on the other side of the Hub. By now, both she and Jack had a mug of Ianto’s best and the Welshman had returned to his work with a pair of toddlers swinging off of his arms like monkeys who’d found a new tree to play on. Jack didn’t envy him, but at least it kept Alex and Roda separated. Alex would work out why he’d upset Roda soon enough, and Roda herself needed time to think. It was a lot to take in. She'd only just gotten her TARDIS fixed up a few months ago, and her scars were finally healing. The Doctor had gotten her back on track, not breathed a word about anything, and left her to herself as soon as he didn't think he needed to watch her. And that amnesia she'd woken up with, that gap in her mind? It all made sense now. The Joneses, Torchwood, and the Doctor had all had someone to recover alongside and talk with. Roda had run off on her own and her friends had chosen to hide the truth, she could tell from Jack, for her own good. Of course what worried Jack more was that if she was taking the news that she had been tortured for nearly a year so well, then it can’t have been the worst thing that she’d been through in her life, while it was by far the worst he or Martha’s family had.

“It’ll hit me harder when I’m on my own. And the Doctor when I get my hands on him for keeping this secret. I think I crossed my timeline being here now." Jack smirked. He knew that well. "And don't think you're off the h-“

“Uncle Jack?” Alex stood meekly between them, staring up at Jack with clear remorse on his face. He sniffed, holding tighter to his toy, and Jack sighed before crouching down and bundling Alex into his arms. Whatever he’d said and whoever his parents were, Alex was only a child, and a good one at that. It wasn’t his fault he’d upset Roda; from the look on her face, she felt the same way. Alex held onto Jack’s army lapels and chewed his lip. “Did I upset the Redjay?”

Jack eyed Roda, then shook his head. “Nah. She’s strong, Roda is.” Roda rolled her eyes with the trace of a smile. He chose to focus on Alex's first question, and not his unintended 'help'. “But she’s very sad about not having her own children.” Jack had explained Alex to Roda already; how smart he was, how he picked up information like a sponge, and how easily his understood the world around him. Roda had deduced from her own knowledge of Time Tots that Alex had understood everything of what the Master had done to her in his presence, when he was only one week old; once Alex had opened up the links, Roda’s mind had patched in the rest of the holes. Jack kept his hand on Roda’s arm as he explained to Alex. “Your Daddy was very lucky to be able to have you, Alex. Time Lords usually can’t have children, because... Uh, Roda, help me out here.”

“A lady called the Pythia cursed us. Do you know what a curse is?” Although her grip on her coffee cup tightened Roda calmly picked up where Jack had let off. Alex nodded. “It means that Time Lords have to make their children very differently to normal... Well, you don’t need to know that until you grow up.”

Jack nodded, and squeezed Alex’s shoulders until the boy smiled again. “Sorry Redjay.” He paused, as something slipped into his memory. “Did you call me a monster on the Valiant?”

Jack winced. Roda crouched down in front of him. “No sweetie, I promise. I said that about someone else.” Roda paused, then pulled one of the feathers out of her hair, threading it through a button on Alex’s shirt and awkwardly patting his head. “Go on and play with Steven. Maybe I’ll see you again one day.”

“Okay!” As his ward wriggled Jack put the boy down. A thought struck him as Alex started to run back to Ianto’s office.

“Alex?” The little boy turned with wide eyes to listen intently. “Don’t tell your Daddy you met the Redjay again, alright?”

“Can I tell Mummy?”

“Better not.” Roda winced, distracting herself with a swig of her black coffee, and Alex disappeared around the corner. After a moment, Roda sighed and let Jack pull her into a proper hug. “He’s a good kid... Shame about his parents.”

“Yep.” Jack chuckled, but his tone was grim. “My thoughts exactly.”


	4. Waffles

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A missing scene from just before chapter 3.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This would probably be crack if I hadn't made it canon over a year ago. Thought at least it does introduce a minor point of the fanon and the Master's current state of affairs?

“What are you doing here?!”

The last time Torchwood had ordered pizza it had not gone well. With Ianto away at his sister’s for the weekend affairs had been left to the team in general; they had managed to order entirely the wrong pizzas for everyone and rack up an impressive phone bill in the process. Jack had dropped his head into his hands to hear that yet another employee had tried to order pizza under the name of Torchwood, this time when the public were a little better at knowing they existed, and declared that if Ianto was not here to organise them all then pizza was not to be ordered. Everyone had agreed; they didn’t need another night of petty arguments and childish sulks as that one had led to.

But the vote had been cast on pizza all the same and with Jack and Gwen out chasing weevils Roda had seen no harm in offering to actually go out to the shops and buy proper pizzas with – Rhys made her promise – proper money. Rhys had agreed to cook them in exchange for not having to guard any weevils that his wife brought back to the Hub. Ianto had been hesitant, but it meant that he could catch up on paperwork, and so he’d left the Time Lady to it. There were several hours to go until people would be needing to eat and anything went wrong she knew how to handle herself. Though what could go dangerously wrong buying pizza he couldn’t work out. Not for lack of trying. Not unless she forgot Gwen’s anchovies.

Roda had needed the time out of the Hub or she wouldn’t have made the offer. She’d spent the last two nights sleeping on a mattress in Jack’s office-cum-home – she’d turned down the offer of his bed, even if Jack and Ianto had as open a relationship as was humanly possible – and her back was killing her. The urge to wander wasn’t helping much either. Buildings weren’t TARDISes, leaving only so many places that you could roam. There wasn’t any major rift activity coming up anytime soon and if Jack objected then Roda could just pawn him off on Ianto and the pizza and his good nature would be back in no time. He knew better than to keep a Time Lord on a leash.

The weather wasn’t too bad, which for Wales meant it wasn’t raining. Roda turned up the collar of her coat and pulled her hands up into the warmth of the sleeve ends, making sure to wait for a reprise from the crowds on the Plass before stepping out of the chameleon filter’s range. She could have taken the front door out of the tourist office of course but the back door was more TARDIS-like and more familiar. It was only an hour’s walk across town for her to get home to where her TARDIS was parked, and from there she surely had a TESCOs bookmarked in her coordinates. A lazy way to do the shopping, she knew, but she could duck back to the TARDIS, feel herself again, and then get the shopping done. Domestic life wasn’t so hard.

TESCOs happened to be in London. The pizza was easy to find. The beer for Rhys, too. Roda scrunched up her shopping list in one hand, digging into her pocket as she walked for the well-worn Arcadian wallet that she had used for centuries. There was a shortcut to the till through the home bakes section and she took it with an amused grin. She had a salary to pay for dinner now; for the first time. Jack was insistent that she keep up appearances, and that he couldn’t just let her work for Torchwood for free. The higher-ups in Canary Wharf had been somewhat irritated to have two aliens on their payroll but Jack’s and the Doctor’s reputations combined sated them, and to all but the highest authorities and her colleagues monthly cheques went to Rhona Dale, perfectly-human human and Ianto’s replacement as dogsbody.

She’d gotten halfway down the aisle before, standing just beside a display cabinet selling state of the art waffle irons and mini ovens, she’d bumped into a sight to wipe the grin right off her face. At least, she reassured herself as she willed her hearts to slow to a more healthy rate, the Master seemed as surprised to see her as she was to see him. Even better was the fact that he wasn’t pointing a laser screwdriver at her and promising pain and anguish… Which was what had happened the last time they’d met, and what would have ended in tears had the Doctor not stood between them and threatened to leave them both in the vortex if they didn’t lower their weapons.

Roda answered without really thinking, not sure what else she was supposed to do. If she’d been missing an adrenaline rush, this wasn’t what she had in mind. She hadn’t quite gotten over The Year That Never Was since the Master’s young son had accidentally spilled the beans. Probably never would; before that, she would never have even considered the life she was living right now. But that didn’t mean she was going to start a fight in the middle of public. She was just surprised, was all; last she’d heard the Doctor was keeping a stern eye on the Master and he wasn’t allowed to just go shopping completely unchaperoned.

“Buying dinner. What are you doing here?!”

“Buying a waffle iron. What does it look like?” He and Roda both glanced down at the sleek red box in his hands, Roda wasn’t sure what was going through his mind, but going through hers was the fact that he had to at least put the appliance down before he could draw a weapon. Then again, if she had to defend herself her arms will stacked with pizzas and a six-pack. The Master gave a condescending sniff before breaking the stare to step to the side, intending to go around her. “Now if you’ll-“

Roda should have been relieved but stuffing dinner under one arm she found herself stepping back in front of him obtrusively. She’d be hitting herself in the morning. “What, to teach Alex how to make poison waffles?”

The Master had been about to haughtily demand that Roda move but her words amused him and he broke into a broad, slightly manic grin. “Actually I could use that.” He turned over the waffle to study it, making a show of not bothering to give Roda his full attention. “Redjay, darling, you must come for breakfast one day.” His eyes glinted and Roda decided to step out of his way after all. Neither Time lord made any attempt to move. “Lucy will make waffles.”

Roda narrowed her eyes with a smirk.

“Because I’m really going to fall for that one.”

“You’ve fallen for worse plans.” The Master shrugged, painfully casual. Roda realised with a start that she’d only ever met his Harold Saxon persona on a television screen, and took refuge in the fact that seeing her without feathers or woad was probably as confusing for him as he was for her. His disguise still let him sneer, though, careful to angle his body so that his face wasn’t seen by the security cameras. Roda bared her teeth, his insult clouding her judgement like only an enemy could do. “Did you honestly think Jack’s little team could make an SOS call from under several tonnes of Himalayas?”

Muttering something that might have been ‘I’m never going shopping again’ Roda ground her teeth together to keep herself from shouting at or shaking him. The pizzas wouldn’t survive the drop and if she could help it, she was going to keep this chance meeting secret unless something went horribly wrong.

But it wasn’t easy. Bringing up The Year That Never Was would drive anyone who remembered it to desperate means. No matter what the Master thought of himself, or the holier-than-thou nature of the Time Lords (Roda regretted not quite being able to remove herself from this blanket description) he had no right to do what he had done. But at least his taunt secured the timeline; Roda hadn’t thought to check the year before ducking out. She reckoned she should really screen for lifeforms before leaving the TARDIS these days.

“I had to be sure, you bastard.”

“Language.” The Master clucked like an old mother, a politician’s grin colouring his face. “We’re in the middle of TESCOs.” He paused, his hum of thought almost a predator’s purr, and Roda shuffled her feet awkwardly. She could easily have just turned and run, there and then. He couldn’t stop her without causing a scene. Which might have this plan, you never knew with madmen. There were thousands of other places where she could pick up dinner. “You’re almost as fond as those monkeys as the Doctor is.” Roda’s back teeth actually squeaked from the pressure she was putting on them. “It’s almost touching.”

“What.” Roda decided to ignore any further taunts – or try to – and to ignore the insult to herself, the Doctor, and to the human race. She could have said a lot of things – ‘you married a monkey’ being top of the list – but she was learning, very slowly, when to bite her tongue. It had only taken a few centuries. “Do you want?”

“I told you.” The Master sniffed. It was no fun when his games didn’t rise to the obvious bait. “I’m shopping. You’re the one causing a scene.”

A lie to make himself feel better. Or a taunt. Roda’s pride battled her self control and the comeback slipped out before she could think better of it.

“Doctor let you out on parole did he?”

“The Doctor,” And there was the temper Roda had met so well, on many occasions. “Has no way of making me stay at home and twiddle my thumbs.” With the waffle iron under his arm he reached out to grip Roda’s shoulder in a vice grip with a mock-gentle pat, making the sentence seem joking, friendly, familiar. Then the Master’s voice turned low, barely a hiss, as Roda grasped his wrist with widened eyes. The six-pack was caught before it could fall, her wrist wrenching with the pain, but the Master let go of her shoulder and ducked to the floor to ‘help’ her pick up the food, pleased to have spooked her. “No way can he enforce it, anyway. And since the government’s little court case came to a unanimous verdict of not guilty of first degree murder,” His quiet voice turned singsong, and Roda childishly made sure to step on his fingers as she straightened up. He clenched his teeth, that time, “No matter how hard Torchwood and UNIT tried, Harold Saxon can do whatever he likes.”

“A jury you rigged.”

“Rigged is such a clean word.” Roda raised an eyebrow as the Master picked up the appliance and flexed his aching fingers. “I prefer hypnotised. More up to the standards of our race than petty haggling.”

And he had a point. Who was the law unto Time Lords these days? No one. Roda scowled, studying how badly the pizzas had taken the fall and wondering if she could convince the cashier that she’d found them that way and get a refund. Hey, TESCOs made a lot of money. And Torchwood Three’s quota was dropping every day. It was – in a way – robbing from the rich to feed the poor.

“I would turn you into the police myself if I thought it would get me anywhere!”

“Oh, I can just imagine!” Roda knew how weak her pouting was a second after she’d said it. The Master too. “’999, can I speak to the police please? Only, ex-prime minister Harold Saxon is really an alien and he hypnotised you all! I thought you might like to know’. Just think,” He tapped his bottom lip, “Maybe they’ll lock you up instead.”

Roda was determined to bring strength to her argument. “Stranger things have happened. There’s that Derren Brown guy. Knighted last week. Channel 4 showed it in 4D.”

“Amateur theatrics.” The Master made a surprised noise at the comparison.

“For us, yes, but not for humans.” She gestured, with difficult, from beneath the boxes that were now supported with two hands. A part of her was enjoying herself. Yes, the Master was a psychopath, but he was also – Roda was loathed to admit it – a challenging opponent and she hadn’t had a good argument in a long time. If, some time in the future, they ever managed to get along…? No. Wasn’t going to happen. “They believe in hypnotism.”

“Oh I believe it in, I just laugh at the notion that a human being can do it.”

“Got protocols in place and everything.” Roda ignored the Master, raising her jaw. She never knew when to quit. “Give them a few years, they’re more intelligent than you give them credit for. They caught you, didn’t they?” And let you go, you conniving bastard, went largely unsaid.

“Careful Redjay.” The Master’s eyes narrowed, a sneer forming even as his pride took another blow. “Someone might think you’re going native again. Don’t want another incidence like the Shobog-”

Roda stepped forward until she could feel the Master’s breath on her face, her toes neatly touched against the tip of his. There was a line that shouldn’t be crossed, and Roda had no equal pain to bring up. Her eyes narrowed, body tensed, with the pizza boxes stuffed under one arm and the heavy six-pack hanging off two fingers of the other hand. She fancied the Master actually seemed startled by the sudden change in Roda’s behaviour, his breath speeding up for a barely noticeable second before returning to its standard, calm pace. Good. She craned her neck to meet his eyes, her branded arm suddenly hot and bothering. All she wanted was to get out of there. 

“Get out of my way.”

“But Redjay.” The Master had controlled himself quickly, pleased to have the upper hand. The waffle iron was pressed between their chests, muffling their heart beats. “We have so much to catch up on!” The Master leaned in, rocking on his toes, to whisper in Roda’s ear. Roda hoped at the very least the cameras made a fortune selling Harold Saxon’s infidelity. That would cause a little trouble, if petty. “You’re looking simply too healthy for your own good.”

Roda drew her head back, spine arching, and broadened the distance between them as she forced herself to turn her back. “I don’t want a fight.”

“Neither do I.” The Master shrugged, walking after Roda. They came to the end of the aisle, and the Master looked left and right. No one there. Roda’s fist clenched apprehensively. “I’d win hands down – it wouldn’t be any fun at all.”

“Then why are you-“

She really should have seen the waffle iron coming. Psychopathic, murdering megalomaniac and all that. Roda ducked the blow to her head, catching the machine on her shoulder instead, and while she was biting down on her lip hard enough to draw blood to stifle the scream of the pain, the Master shouted, the waffle iron falling to the ground as he stumbled away from her with a manic glint in his eyes.

“Gun!” Roda groaned. Her coat had flapped back when she had fallen, the boxes and cans crashing to the ground as she grabbed at the agonising pain in her shoulder, She turned to glare at the Master as he pulled another breath of air into his lungs, as though that could stop his irrational shouting. “She has a gun!”

Roda hissed, her hand going limp. “You bloody bastard!”

“Well I know you’re carrying one.” The Master nodded, and Roda made a mental note to discuss things with Jack when everything had calmed the hell down. Though the way things were going she was going to need to take a detour or two before returning to Torchwood. “And it’s always fun to cause you and the freak a little trouble.”

The shop had gone wild. Half of the shoppers – even nowhere near them – had turned to run for the exit of the large shop while others had stopped to stare, thinking they’d stumbled into the set of a new movie or television show. Roda could see camera phones come out and – seeing the security guards running towards them and realising with great distaste that it wouldn’t do for either of their faces to make the press – turned to her side to ram the Master with her uninjured shoulder, throwing him off balance. The Master gasped, surprised, and took a hold of both Roda’s shoulders in a grapple, scowling enough, she thought, to burn holes in her skin as he pushed her away. Hampered by the injury Roda could only fall, but she kicked out with one foot, clipping the Master’s ankles and toppling him in turn.

As the words of the guards could just be made out and the last of the general public realised that they weren’t on the set of a film the Master tumbled shoulders first into a pyramid of canned fruits and Roda landed on the edge of and slipped into the nearest open-top freezer display with a yelp. From over sprawled legs, the two Time Lords appraised each other and the approaching and or fleeing crowd, before the Master gave an over-weary sigh and tapped the side of his thigh with exaggerated ceremony. The crowd froze like puppets with cut strings. One by one, parts of the crowd started to tape in time. The Master pouted.

“You always spoil my fun.”

Roda blinked, shocked out of her anger, and ignoring the ice melting down her back pulled herself out of the freezer. The Master brushed himself off as he climbed out of the tins with much greater ease, and just as many small cuts and bruises as she had.

“How – how – how did you do that?”

“Oh, Torchwood didn’t get all of my toys.”

The Master poked at Roda’s arm, and she turned to move the limb away, hastily rustling in her pockets and stuffing a wad of notes between her lips. Too much to pay for the food, but screw it. She started backing away from the Master slowly, forgetting the beer, grabbing the pizzas under her arm with what she supposed was probably shock. As she got to the tills and threw down the money she turned to face her adversary, incredulous, sure that she was going to snap the second he was out of her sight. He nodded his permission for Roda to leave, as though she needed it.

“I suggest you run before I change my mind.” The whole room was tapping their legs now, and Roda closed her eyes briefly against the deafening tap-tap-tap-tap. She took the Master’s advice at a sprint. “Lucy will be very upset if I get us both arrested, I think.” As Roda rounded the corner and disappeared, the Master took pulled his sleeves over his bleeding wrists and surveyed the scene. He spoke quietly to himself, smiling. “Now… That’s interesting.”

With a snap of his fingers the crowd returned to normal as though nothing had happened, and Harold Saxon turned to ask one very confused security guard if he should take the waffle iron or just an empty box to the till…


	5. Chapter 3

"Now Roda.” The Doctor winced, wagging a finger warning. “He is not guilty by association just because he’s grown up now...!”

The Doctor knew that the Redjay and the Seeker had met once, but it was only once. He was only now learning that she’d met the Seeker in Jack’s company when the boy had been three years old, but it didn’t matter; at the age of three, she’d been willing to pretend that he wasn’t the child of an enemy who had tortured and nearly killed her. From there on, the Doctor had watched as she went on with her life, bouncing back even more quickly than he did, keeping an eye on her with the hurdles she'd passed, and did her best to avoid the entire Saxon/Master family as much as she could; although they were good friends, Roda had even left him without saying goodbye if she thought that she might have to see the Master and the Doctor was perfectly safe to be left alone. Being older than both of them had done nothing for Roda’s maturity, but in the end the Doctor had seen the merit to having a Time Lady who intimately knew Rassilon’s Era of Gallifrey in the Seeker's life. Even if Gallifrey was gone – and seemingly for good – the Seeker had to learn about his race and his history from someone who knew it better than his father and uncle. Roda, being the only other Time Lord still alive, was needed for the job, but the Doctor hadn’t expected her to react so badly to a child who had done her no wrong. Of course she’d turned up on his doorstep before he’d even had a chance to ask her to pay a visit.

“He’s been living with him all this time, hasn’t he?”

“No, he-“

“And even if he’s not...” Roda lost track of her words, waving her uninjured arm dramatically. “The-the Master!”

“Not guilty by association, Roda! And you need medica-”

“How can you grow up with him as your father and not have a screw or two loose?”

“I’m right here you know.”

The Seeker rolled his eyes and folded his arms, resting his elbows on the mountain of textbooks and papers he had been working on. It was the Easter break, and he didn’t appreciate being spoken over, even by the Doctor and Roda. And besides, he was working. Doing a Master's and a PhD in half a year was a rather ambitious project, but having decided to do some actual work at Cambridge he figured he might as well go for broke. Especially considering how things were with Allison - burying himself in work seemed a good option while waiting for her to decide where they were at now. Although meeting the elusive fourth Time Lord in existence was even better. 

As it was, the Seeker was intelligent enough that his earliest memories of the Redjay came from a week old, watching the woman crouch bloodied and bruised in a corner while his father threw insults and punches and laughed. He knew enough to know it was abuse – and he had control over his own mind to decide that it was unwarranted torture – but he’d never held it against his father, because that was how the Master worked. Not to mention, as the Doctor had grown immune to stress and the Redjay almost to physical pain, the Seeker had grown more-or-less immune to his parents. He took one look at the two pureblood Time Lords arguing across the TARDIS console and stood up to add his penny’s worth.

“...What?”

“I’m right here, Redjay, Doctor.”

He sighed as though it was perfectly simple, which in his mind it was. The Doctor had the grace to at least try to look sheepish; the Redjay was still glaring at him as though he had personally committed the murders that the Master was both guilty and proud of. She'd forgiven the Doctor (and Jack) for keeping the secret for over a year (she'd been an outlier to remembering The Year, close enough to the epicentre but badly shaken enough for her brain to have, temporarily, blocked out the memory), but he knew a part of her was still hurt by that, too. The Seeker at least knew a little about her now, from the Doctor and from the Master. He knew that she had been exiled from Gallifrey before his father was even loomed, and he knew from the Doctor that she was innocent of her charge of high treason. She was far from innocent of all her crimes, however; the nineteen recorded breakages of Gallifrey’s Non-Interference policy were backed up by several hundred years and several hundred charges of theft, assault, breaking and entering and once more, a this-time-warranted charge of treason against England’s eleventh century Prince regent. She was wanted in that century too, and recorded in history as one of the Merry Men, and Jack had told him that she was probably still on the Time Agency’s wanted list as well. The planet of Bandraginus Five told her story as a legend, but opinions were mixed, and neither the Doctor nor the Master had felt fit to share that particular story, yet; the Master protested that she was a danger, but the Doctor assured the Seeker that she had her hearts in the right place, despite her methods. The Seeker was waiting to pass his own judgement.

“...Sorry about that!” The Doctor was first to interrupt the Seeker’s thought process, and nudged Roda pointedly in the ribs as only a close friend could. He looked as though he wasn’t sure who he was supposed to be apologising to. “Roda, say sorry.”

“But-!”

“Roda.”

“Right, fine.” Roda set her jaw, turning to hold her dislocated shoulder as far away from both of them as she humanely could. The Seeker noticed belatedly why the Doctor had been trying to chaperone her to the Zero Room since her TARDIS docked with his in the middle of the Medusa Cascade. “Alex, I’m sorry I’m in a bad mood, but your Dad’s just nearly broken my arm with a waffle iron.” She looked at the Doctor with a furiously raised eyebrow, and the other Time Lord muttered under his breath.

“That was not an apology.” 

Roda snorted. 

“But will you just sit down or do I have to _make_ you sit down and you do _not_ want me to have to _make_ me sit down.” The Doctor paused. “I will turn this TARDIS around!” Alarmed, Roda sat down quickly, dropping into the plastic captain’s chair and letting her bad arm swing like the pendulum in a clock. She finally looked sheepish – or hurt – and the Doctor sighed, adjusting his tie and running a hand through his hair before gesturing acerbically with both hands. “Wait there and don’t kill each other! No Allons-y-Alonso-ing.” For the first time, the Seeker and Roda shared a confused look, almost one of camaraderie in the face of the Doctor’s unique... Doctor-ness..

The Doctor’s gaze slipped over the coat wrapped around Roda's waist and the gun hanging at her hip before he bounded across the TARDIS through the nearest door in a hunt for a first aid kit. Roda glared at Alex for a couple of seconds before closing her eyes and doing her best – rather childishly – to ignore him. A few seconds later, she howled in pain then quickly shut her mouth, blinking rapidly. She flexed the fingers of her hand experimentally, and the Seeker let go of her arm, her shoulder relocated. Roda’s gaze strayed to the dim turquoise lighting of the console, and the Seeker took a few steps back, not entirely comfortable being as close as he was to the renegade, or so it seemed.

“...Thanks.”

“Don’t mention it. And it’s Seeker, by the way.”

“Wha-?”

“That’s the name I use now.” The Seeker played absently with a pen, and leaned on the console a little away from the Redjay, tipping his head to one side. "The name I chose." He seemed – despite his attempt at diplomacy – to be somewhat amused as he regarded her. “Did my father really attack you with a waffle iron?”

“Bloody big one. Last time I get pizza in TESCOs.” She paused. "At least I didn't order in again."

“What was he doing in TESCOs?”

“Skaro if I know.” The Redjay snorted. “Buying a waffle iron, I suppose...” In the end the Redjay convulsed into barely restrained chuckling as she tore a strip from the sleeve of her cotton shirt and wrapped it above the worst of the cuts on her arms and face. Once the tourniquet was fashioned and the Redjay a little calmer, the Seeker continued his string of rational thought.

“But if he hit your shoulder, how did you get covered in blood?”

“They’re not as bad as the Doctor thinks.” The Time Lady rolled her eyes, but the Seeker noted how she still winced when she touched the cuts or moved too fast. “I fell through a display cabinet. The Master went over a pyramid of tin cans. I managed to get away while we were both trying not to get arrested and the Master sort of...” She waved her hand, scowling in thought, "Did something. Wishy washy. Said he hadn't had all his toys taken away."

“Oh.” That made sense. The Archangel Network... The Seeker coughed, wondering if the Doctor knew, then brushed the thought aside and focused on the task at hand. Although inquisitive, he had always been polite, and waited for the Redjay to ask more before he spoke. “He probably wanted to get something for Mum’s birthday... Are you going to be okay?”

“I’ve been through worse...” The Redjay gritted her teeth and looked him straight in the eye at last. She had no desire to butter the facts for the Seeker, nor would she, no matter what the Doctor asked of her. “I was shot in the back, when I was as old as you are, in full Gallifreyan terms. Three times, once to the hip – the bullets are still there. Then I was drowned as a witch. And then I was hanged.” The Seeker nodded, making no comment. Roda – who had recounted the facts without much emotional response, suddenly shivered as though cold cyanide had been trickled down her spine. “Then Daleks. And that’s just the regenerations.”

“Daleks? Really?" With some surprise, Roda thought he almost sounded less scared, and more excited. Not something she'd ever felt about Daleks, personally, but then she and the Seeker were only alike in a handful of ways. "Like, the ones the Time Lords fought in the Time War? What did that feel like?”

“I fought in the War, too." The Seeker decided to respect that she only answered one of his questions. Her eyes had darkened slightly in memory. "And no, I didn’t desert, I just lost Wick.” She sighed, and chewed the end of her hair, turning the claddagh ring on her hand over a few times before continuing. “Anyway, sorry. I had no call to-“

“You were hurt, you were angry, my Dad did it. It makes sense; vengeance against the closest available source.” He paused. “You weren’t all that happy with the Doctor either, were you?” Awkwardly, Roda shook her head. “So it’s right. Or at least, justified.” With a diplomacy from his father’s side, the Seeker joked. “At least you didn’t attack me with a waffle iron. The Doctor probably has ten.”

Roda laughed. “You’re not half bad, kid.”

“Mum’s side, I know.”

“No, that’s not what I meant...”

“I know. I was joking.” The Seeker grinned. “And I’m not a kid.”

“’Course not. That’s what I would have said too.” Reminiscently, she pulled at her bottom lip between her teeth, and stretched out her ankles to test for any other cuts that she hadn’t yet found. The Seeker found her tolerance to pain applaudable despite himself; it far extended that of other Time Lords. Then again, he didn’t know if that was a feature of Time Ladies in general or of the Redjay herself, so he didn’t comment. Either way, she was the only one left, just as he was the only Time Tot in existence. Knowing how Roda felt about children, he didn’t comment on that either, but instead listened to her think out loud. “My guardian wasn’t exactly what you’d call the ‘hip’ type.” Roda rubbed the side of her head. “No, not Raz.”

“Rassilon?” The Time Tot blinked. “The Rassilon?”

“I was born before he died. Before the curse, too. I was a member of his Chapter," Roda didn't seem to realise, to the Seeker's eye, that she was talking so openly, "The Prydonians, and my House was extinct down the paternal line when... Dad was killed.” Changing the subject, Roda left it at that. “So how much do you know about Gallifrey anyway?”

“Well I've built a carbon copy." Roda's jaw nearly hit the floor. "But beyond it being beautiful, not a lot,” admitted the Seeker with a frown, “Just what Dad’s bothered to tell me. He doesn’t think Old Gallifey’s important, he’s obsessed with his idea of what Gallifrey should be. And the Doctor just martyrs it into perfection and changes the subject.”

“Sounds about right.” Roda smiled and ruffled the Seeker's hair before she could help herself, standing on tiptoes to reach him. Even Alex was taller than her, despite being over a thousand years younger; she wasn’t impressed. But there wasn’t exactly a lot she could do for the genes that regeneration had repeatedly dealt her without defying the laws of her existence. Scowl eradicated, she folded one of her legs over the other, smudging woad over her cheek as she rubbed one eye with the back of her hand. Her next words left her mouth before her stubborn side could silence them. “Do you want to know more?”

***

“Where did Roda go? And what’re you holding?”

The Doctor returned slightly belatedly, soaked to the bone and with arms full of arnica and bandages. He had a bottle of medicinal alcohol from Arkannis Major stuffed under one of his arms, and a strange green bottle that made the Seeker wrinkle his nose stuffed under the other. The Seeker’s eyes widened just for a second, and then he let his eyebrows drop back down again. It was exactly the kind of thing he was used to seeing in the Doctor’s TARDIS, especially where a friend was concerned. The Master’s son’s fingers curled around something folded up in one of his palms as he pointed down one of the labyrinth corridors that branched off from the console room of the Doctor’s TARDIS. There was a confused look on the face; the Doctor started to worry, until he saw Roda’s coat and - he grimaced - gun tucked into their usual cubby-hole beside the helm.

“She’s collapsed in one of your spare rooms.” The Doctor let out a thankful breath at the Seeker's explanation, then gestured at the paper in the Seeker's fist again. “And it's the outer-dimensionary coordinates for her TARDIS.”

“...Well. That's a... Don't give that to the Master, eh?" The Doctor blinked in surprise. He knew how to find Roda's TARDIS when she was actively hiding, but to have shared it with the Seeker already? He must have impressed her, somehow. “Means you can theoretically find her when she's parked, unless she changes the coordinates or purposefully hides."

"I know."

"Oh." The Doctor coughed. "Of course you do... What did she give you that for?”

“So she can give me Gallifrey lessons.”

“But how did you-“ The Doctor managed a pout. He'd wanted to ask her to do that, himself. He stepped closer, dumping his armful of medical supplies onto a bench; he’d make sure Roda got herself patched up later. Then he turned to the Seeker, a stern look on his face. “Did you read my mind, Seeker?”

“No.” The Seeker shrugged. “She just offered.” He sank back down behind the mountain of books he’d been deeply engrossed in before the Redjay’s appearance. “Said her knowledge of Gallifrey was – and I quote – ‘a Skaro of a lot better’ than anything my ‘bastard of a father’ could tell me.” The Doctor was speechless for the first time – the Seeker suspected – in his life. “So I said yeah.”

“...Right. Well, then, Seeker, right.” The Doctor swung on his heels, then loped back over to the TARDIS console and started fiddling with buttons. “While Roda’s sleeping... let's have a look at how far you've got with your thesis.”


End file.
